(1) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to digital television and in particular to the management of recordings of television signals stored on storage unit of a television recording apparatus.
(2) Description of Related Art
Various types of television recording apparatus capable of storing recordings of television signals are known, for example in which the storage unit is a high capacity storage media such as a hard disk drive. Inevitably the storage capacity of the storage unit is limited, and so the stored recordings must be managed to retain sufficient storage capacity for new recordings. Typically, the deletion of unwanted recordings is performed by the user controlling the apparatus, for example using a graphical interface providing for selection and deletion of recordings on a recording list of the stored recordings. Such management of the recordings can be inconvenient to the user, particularly as the number of recordings increases with improvements in the technology of the storage unit leading to increased capacity.
WO-2008/002309 discloses a television recording apparatus having an operation which assists the user in managing the storage of television recordings. In particular, responsive to input of a command to cease reproduction after a predetermined portion of a recording, for example 90%, the apparatus outputs a signal for display of a graphical interface providing for user input to indicate a desire for deletion of the recording or not. The apparatus accepts such user input, and, responsive to user input indicating a desire for deletion of the recording, deletes the recording.
On the premise that a user is likely to want to delete a program which has been watched in its entirety, this operation allows the user to delete watched programs in an easy manner, that is simply by providing input in response to the graphical interface. The assumption is made that a program has been watched in its entirety when the predetermined portion of the recording has been reproduced. However, this assumption is not necessarily correct, because for a given program may occupy less than the predetermined portion of the recording, for example due to a program being recorded with additional unwanted programming at the end as a safety margin. This limits the effectiveness of the operation. Depending on the predetermined portion used, the graphical interface may be displayed when a program has not been fully watched or may fail to be displayed when a program has actually been fully watched. It would be desirable to avoid this.